“Search efforts are ongoing at the sites of former villages and burial locations. Ukraine is determined to accelerate this process,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on X on July 11.
On July 11, when Poland marks the National Day of Remembrance for the Victims of the Volhynia Genocide, the Ukrainian president did not explicitly condemn the criminal actions of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) against Poles. Instead, he wrote about paying tribute to the murdered civilians.
“We Must Not Forget”
Zelensky stressed that representatives of the Ukrainian state took part in joint prayer services alongside representatives of the Polish state, both in Ukraine and in Poland. In his post, he argued that Ukraine is working to establish the facts concerning those who were killed during those years in a fair and just manner.
“Search operations are underway at the sites of former villages and burial locations. Ukraine is committed to accelerating this process.”
He also recalled that exhumation work in Wola Ostrowiecka and Ostrówki is scheduled to begin in two days.
“What we need is the full truth and a Christian commemoration of the victims. But we must also remember that today, in our own time, Ukraine and Poland face one common threat, which is a deadly threat to our independence, to both our states, to every city and every village.”
He emphasized that this threat is Russia.
Zelensky added that “as we speak about the past, we must not cast doubt on the future of our nations – the future of Ukraine, of Poland, and the future of all of Europe.”
Earlier, Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance reported that, so far, the Ukrainian side has granted permission only for some of the search operations and exhumations requested by the Polish side.